Page Four THE MICHIGAN DAILY Sunday, February 16, 1975 ) BOO KS Burgess' new testament: On the American corruption, of Art IIrlic Cfc 1cf" Q A ICf1"PCSczi THE CLOCKWORK TESTA- MENT OR ENDERBY'S END by Anthony Burgess. N e w York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1975, 235 pp., $6.9S. By SUSAN ORLEAN ANTHONY BURGESS is an extremely clever and arti- culate English writer with a good deal of insight into Amer- ican culture. The welding of style and content, form and sub- stance has always .been a hall- mark of his work. In Enderby's End, Burgess fully exercises his talents in both directions and provides the reader with an amusing and perceptive account of one man against the world. That man is Professor Ender- by, a romantic, eccentric Brit- isher, replete with strange bath- room habits and excesive para- noias. Enderby, poet and schol- ar, is a visiting professor at the University of Manhattan. Iiis fame, or perhaps notoriety, is due to a screenplay he has pen- ned. After it is sold to Holly- wood, the screenplay is adulter- ated into a sex-and-bloxl extra- vaganza surpassing in horror but somewhat reminiscent of "A Clockwork Orange". As a result. Enderby is the victim of attack from evey angle - his students, the press, anonymous callers, and then, of course, the typical New York muggers and hustlers. During an appearance as a guest on a talk show he is verbally assault- ed by a movie queen, a psychcl- ogist, the wise-cracking host of the show, and an audience that is. out for anybody's head. The portrait of Enderby is unforgettable. Burgess creates the personification of twentieth- century paranoia - the quirky but tender poet somehow mis- placed in hostile New York, the artist compromised by his so- ciety. IPNDERBY's strengh begins to flag as the novel pro- gresses, and the plot begins to sag with him. The last third of the book is somewhat disap- pointing - all of Burgess' pa- tent puns and slick wordings are here, but in an anemic state. Enderby's death at the end of the book is moye of a nodding-off than a climax. Bur- gess' wry humor cannnot hold up without spirit, which t e story and character seem 4o1 lose in the process. The book's stronger noints of- ten lie in smaller places. Bur- gess' description of the seamsy side of New York is perfect. Every spare-changer, subway terrorist, and lecher that lurks through New York every day somehow finds Enderby a n d tangles with him. His obnoxious students are appropriately has- tile, and Enderby' hopeless en- counter with his creative writing class is perhaps the funniest and most successful section of the novel. Unfortunately these strong points are countered with scen- es that just don't work, such as the final one in which Enderby ends up sleeping with a woman who has come to kill him. The situation is rather obviously con- trived, and is carried on so wearily that the reader may well be relieved when Enderby keels over in front of the tele- vision, and thus wins his war with the world. BURGESS also makes provoc- ativepoints concerning art and the artist's responsibility to the public. Is art "neutral, nei- ther teaching nor provoking, a static shimmer" as E iderby would like to believe? Or in fact is it the ultimate expressionism, and thus to be held acco rirable for its effects? Enderby's screenplay has be- come a movie in which nuns are frequently raped and ravague. In the wake of the film.,, re- lease, youths everywhere tke up this as sport. Enderby would like to forget the whole af1.Jir, but the world won't let him. Burgess' manipulation ct this tension is the highlight of En- derby's End. His inability to sustain it is its failure. Susan Orlean is a sophomore majoring in English. reverend peers into t A MONTH OF SUNDAYS I THROUGH THE shrewd a n d by John Updike. Alfred A. somewhat illiberal medium Knopf: New York, 228 pp., of the Reverend Marshfield $6.95. (who prefers Barth. to Tillich, By RICHARD STREICKER comfort to the void, and nags A Month of Sundays, Joh n unmercifully both his virtuous Updike's seventh novel, is cx- wife Jane and his liberal, bi- tremely long for a short book, sexual, socially-conscious as- { -- Updike's prose, always written sistant Ned Bork) the problems .::::